Issues with a Tektronix TDS350 and LabView

[preilly]

So I am supposed to write a program to read and record measurements from a Tektronix TDS350 oscilloscope.  A rather easy task but  I have never used LabView before so I am lost.

From previous threads I have downloaded the tktdds3xx driver and when trying to run the example vi's the error "Error -1073807343 occurred at Old VISA Open in TKTDS 3xx Initialize.vi->Untitled 1" comes up.

Again from previous threads, I replaced the Old VISA Open with VISA Open, but am having difficulties after that point.  Any help after that would be great.

Thanks in advance.

-Pat

[smercurio_fc]

Have you verified that you can talk to the instrument using MAX? That's the first step you should take. In MAX you should be able to see the device listed there.

Also, you did not indicate whether you're talking to it using GPIB or serial (not sure if that instrument supports both interfaces).

[preilly]

It is connected through a serial port, although it does have GPIB (which I doubt is an option for me to use).

Using MAX, the COM port it is connected to is showing up, but not the specific device. 

I also had difficultly figuring out the follow from another thread regarding this topic. "On the connector pane, wire the VISA session control to where the string was (most likely the top left). "

Thanks

-Pat

[Dennis_Knutson]

First, all that you you will ever see in MAX for serial is the com port. You will never see a specific instrument listed. It's not like GPIB where MAX can go out and check whcich instruments are connected. There are no serial standards that make it possible.

Second, the error means " Insufficient location information or the device or resource is not present in the system." You could be getting this error is you did not select the correct VISA resource.

Third, why don't you post the VI you modified? If you did it inocrrectly, your initialize function will not work.

Lastly, you might want to check the resources for learning LabVIEW at http://www.ni.com/academic/lv_training/how_learn_lv.htm. You will learn the relationship between a VI's connector pane (and what that actualy is) and the controls and indicators of the VI.

[smercurio_fc]

In addition to what Dennis said, I am assuming the drivers you downloaded are from here. These drivers were not written to work with the serial interface. In fact, they all say "GPIB". Since you have a serial connection you will need to modify the Initialize function to work with serial. VISA will work with either serial or GPIB, but if you're using serial you need to configure the serial port settings, and you need to use the proper VISA resource string. The resource string will be something like "ASRL1::INSTR".

The important thing is that you need to configure the serial port. Your best bet is to download a driver for a different instrument that either does both serial and GPIB and simply modify the Initialize function for the TDS350 in the same way, or download a driver that does serial only and modify the Initialize function in the same way. The driver for the TDS 210 is one that does both GPIB and serial, while the one for the 720 is one that does serial only.